Exodus from Team Secret; EE, 1437, Aui out

Within the first 24 hours of the drop phase – the first part of the team registration process, Jacky “EternaLEnVy” Mao, Kurtis “Aui_2000” Ling and Theeban “1437” Siva have left Team Secret. The team’s sub-par performance at TI6 and early elimination in lower bracket round 1 had already fueled rumors then of roster changes. Players and teams have until September 4th to leave or drop members in preparation for the official registration and addition of members between September 4-18th.

Within one day of Valve announcement of the new Fall Major team registration dates and changes to the process, three players have left Team Secret roster.

EternaLEnVy, along with coach 1437 and substitute player Aui_2000 have all made an active decision to remove themselves from the current roster.

Their departures signal their status as free agents and the possibilities of being recruited elsewhere.

EternaLEnVy had been with the team since the complete overhaul following TI5, being rebuilt around Clement “Puppey” Ivanov. 1437 was recruited in March, just after their victory at Shanghai Major to be the coach of the team for the upcoming season. And Aui_2000 was taken on as a substitute for the TI6 open qualifiers after the Team Secret mid season reshuffle resulted in the Canadian player being displaced from Evil Geniuses.

There has been no official confirmation of changes by the players or team at this point. Nothing is set in stone yet as any player can be re-added to the team during the second phase – the add period.

For the team registrations this year, there is a two step or phase registration period including drop phase and add phase.

Teams have 17 days (now until September 4th) to release players from their current rosters for the upcoming season. This is an active process unlike previous seasons where the entire team was automatically dropped. Therefore players must leave the team or the management needs to remove any players that will not continue competing with the team. Any players that are still remaining on the team after September 4th are automatically locked in to the team.

New players can then be added to the roster between September 4-18th (two weeks) – locking on September 18th at 12:00AM PDT. This includes re-adding players that left or were dropped in the first phase.

Team Secret

Team Secret at ESL One Manila © ESL

An unexpected pre-TI shuffle was set off when Secret’s Team Director, Kemal Sadikoglu, took to Twitter to announce Saahil “UNiVeRsE” Arora’s departure to EG, in the middle of the Manila Major.

Team Secret sought out a replacement: former EG player Kanishka ‘Sam’ “BuLba” Sosale. In a timeless loop of exchanges, Kurtis “Aui_2000” Ling has registered as Team Secret’s sub, having been let go from EG after being replaced with Ludwig “zai” Wåhlberg.

Team Secret has had sub-par performances and disappointing results since they initiated a big roster shuffle after the Shanghai Major that tore apart Evil Geniuses and created Digital Chaos.

Their domination in the open and regional qualifiers for TI6 gave them a second chance at participating in The International 6 main event.

Team Secret took second place at StarLadder i-League StarSeries Season 2 and 13-16th place at TI6 after being seeded into the lower brackets bo1 elimination series and falling to LGD.